From the Journals of Viktor R Krum
by greenleaf-in-bloom
Summary: Viktor's journal...his POV from Durmstang's arrival at Hogwarts, plus some flashbacks. How is he really treated? What are his thoughts?
1. Entry One: Hogwarts

FROM THE JOURNAL OF VIKTOR R. KRUM  
  
We arrived this evening at Hogwarts. The reports I had heard of it did not do it anywhere near to justice. I felt unwell and told the Headmaster it might be better if Rishkaa took over steering - she is the best at engineering after me. He just barked at me to get back to my place. I don't mean to sound egotistical, but I'm usually very good at steering. Today, however, I coughed so hard once that my hand jerked and the ship veered all the way out of the boundaries, and I had to scream at Ricor to stop the ship. The Headmaster was appalled with my behavior and backhanded me when I reminded him that I had told him I wasn't feeling well.  
  
Furious and humiliated, I returned to steering, using an Attentiveness Spell when he wasn't looking. We were only a bit late to Hogwarts, but before getting off the ship, he got up in my face and told me I'd better not keep that up or I'd feel more than that. He pointed threateningly at the bruise that was blossoming on my cheek with his wand, but then his hand relaxed and he healed it, once again treating me like an honorary nephew.  
  
I hate him.  
  
I'm lying now on my bunk on the ship, as I will for the rest of the year, listening to Jarred sleep beneath me and Ricor on the loft bed across the room. Every time I have stopped writing for even a moment, I feel my hands shaking and aching dully. I've been holding my quill too tight. I hate him. I hate him. It feels good to write that. I know he will never read it, unless of course he comes in here while I'm at the school sometimes and uses a Revealer.  
  
Back to this evening. The Beaubatons students had already arrived when we got off the ship. It was so much warmer than at school that I couldn't believe it - I feel overheated even now - but they were all shivering madly.  
  
I had studied the chastle and bought Hogwarts, A History - (I cannot say that I finished it, but I did buy it, and read about two hundred pages and looked at all the pictures). I was still astonished, however. I sat with the Slytherins - Headmaster Karkaroff said they were "more like us". If he meant that, like him, they had an unnerving interest in the Dark Arts, he was right. I wish I could have sat with another table - Gryffindor, perhaps. They seem to be the most reputable of the lot.  
  
Some smug and detestably rich boy spoke to me about his father all through dinner. From the way he spoke, I have good reason to believe that Lucius Malfoy is a Death Eater. Yes, I recognized the name. I had actually run into him the night of the World Cup. It fits, yes. Dinner consisted of strange and delicious dishes. I thought I had eaten the best foods there were, but apparently I was wrong. They had what one of the Malfoy boy's friends called a peppermint bomba - that's what it sounded like he said, in any case, but his mouth was full of chicken.  
  
In addition to all of this, I find myself liking Hogwarts' reputable Headmaster Dumbledore immensely despite his definite oddness. I had always thought of him as being more solemn, but now I do remember his Chocolate Frog card. I checked through my collection before starting to write tonight. Tenpin bowling and chamber music? I wouldn't be surprised now to hear him say he was interested in playing in the sandlot and American punk rock.  
  
I saw two other famous figures tonight. Mad-Eye Moody, the world-renowned Auror - yes, I do know him, despite being Muggle-born - is their Defense Against Dark Arts teacher, and Karkaroff nearly ran into Harry Potter while scolding Poliakoff and praising me, as he always does in public. I hadn't thought about meeting him. Perhaps I will get the chance to speak to him. His history - well, I wouldn't speak to him about that, but - really, he's too young to have gone through so much. I must admit, I am very thrilled to think that I may get a chance to have a conversation with him.  
  
It may sound stupid - I've met so many people - but this is Harry Potter. He seems rather quiet, and polite. Mad-Eye Moody is quite the opposite - well, he's not exactly impolite. A talk with him might be helpful as well. If I am made champion - I know that there are people better suited to it, but if - I will need everything I can get. Karkaroff looked positively terrified at meeting Moody, which of course delighted me.  
  
Potter - Harry - whatever I should call him - Mr. Potter, I suppose - looked embarrassed when Moody brought attention to him. I looked instead at his friends, a grimacing red-headed boy and an extremely pretty girl with brown hair. I wondered if she was Potter's girlfriend, or the red- haired boy's. I'm embarrassed to write that, but that is what I wondered. They looked like just friends. It's not that I'm interested in dating her or anything - no, I can imagine what the reporters would have to say about that. Just maybe talking to her, too.  
  
Halloween  
  
We put our names in the Goblet of Fire very early. I had a strange and quite unsettling dream involving our Headmaster, Harry Potter, Lucius Malfoy and myself, and my hand shook under Karkaroff's eye as I write VIKTOR KRUM - DURMSTRANG. I reached up to drop my name in, and Poliakoff behind me jostled me. My hand slipped into the flames, and I cried out, but it didn't hurt. It was like a warm breeze flickering around my fingers, but it frightened me. My hand, I thought. My hand.  
  
I was quite jumpy all day. I skipped lunch, roaming around the grounds, and nearly ran right into an enormous man with black hair. Slightly frightened, I stepped back, but the man said to me, "No, wait."  
  
I stopped. "I'm sorry," I told him, knowing my voice was a bit shaky. He looked like he was part giant or something.  
  
"Nah, it's all right. Viktor Krum, right?"  
  
I hated that I never had to introduce myself after I made the team little over a year ago.  
  
"Yes."  
  
His eyes narrowed, and I wanted to sigh. There they are again. Just because I only got an acceptance letter from Durmstrang doesn't make me a bad person! I was Muggle-born! I didn't even know there were other schools!  
  
"Isn't it lunchtime?"  
  
"Er, yes, sir."  
  
"It's Hagrid."  
  
"I just wasn't hungry, Mr. Hagrid."  
  
"Just Hagrid, Mr. Krum."  
  
"Viktor."  
  
"Nervous?"  
  
"A bit," I said, and almost bit my lip. I was nervous, all right, but I was also uneasy.  
  
"Well, good luck to yeh. I know that a lot of the students will be cheering for yeh."  
  
"Thank you, Hagrid."  
  
The man nodded, turned, and stumped off into the trees. I didn't trust him entirely. He had seemed all right, despite being enormous, until he'd realized who I was.  
  
I went back to the ship and brooded in my room for the remainder of the afternoon. By the time Karkaroff shouted that we all had to get out there for dinner at the castle, I'd been pacing anxiously for almost an hour. None of my roommates had been in.  
  
All through the meal, I felt my eyes darting about and I knew I was figiting. I'd purposely sat far away from the Malfoy boy, and he was glaring at me. My roving gaze fell on the Potter boy and his friends. He looked tense. Why, I wondered? He was too young to have entered. I looked at his friends - or rather, his friend, the girl - and then forced myself to look away, anywhere.  
  
When the flames turned red, I felt myself shaking. A slip of paper flew into Dumbledore's hand. "The champion -" Oh, I thought, oh good God, please be Beaubatons or Hogwarts first, not us, not us, I don't want to find out that I didn't do it - "- from Durmstrang -" Oh, no, oh, no, but everyone's eyes flickered to me. I felt the blood drain out of my face. I stopped breathing. My heartbeat, my pulse, seemed to scream. For an instant all was still. I saw Harry Potter staring raptly at the goblet. "- will be Viktor -" He said my last name, but I didn't hear it. My whole body relaxed, and I breathed in, a gasp. Cheering.  
  
Someone patted my back. Where? That door, he had said, that door. I stood, dazed, and walked toward the other room. I walked past the teacher's table and saw Hagrid, clapping loudly but with mixed emotions covering his face. Karkaroff was shouting, but as I closed the door to the room and looked around at the pictures on the wall, all I could think was What?  
  
The Beaubatons champion came in next, smiling broadly. She introduced herself as Fleur Delacour. She had been at the World Cup, I was sure of it. I was also sure that she was at least a quarter veela. I have never liked veela - they don't have the same effect on me as on most males, they just make me feel unsettled. I was unimpressed by her, though.  
  
Then a tall, smiling boy - Cedric, Cedric Diggory, he told me politely, shaking my hand with a firm grasp - came in followed by a thunderstorm of applause. Fleur smiled at him as he shook her hand, and he was quite polite to her as well, but I could see his eyebrow rise.  
  
And then Harry - I'll call him Harry now - and then Harry opened the door. He looked utterly lost, and he wasn't smiling at all. He looked confused.  
  
I need not describe what happened next, as I will never forget it. 


	2. Entry Two: The Girl

FROM THE JOURNAL OF VIKTOR R. KRUM  
  
As I write the rain pours down outside, but I do not care. I have seen her again, and I have realized what it is that struck me. The girl, Harry's friend. The thing I see is magnificence, and the emotion I feel is one I thought I would never feel. One that I swore I would never allow myself to feel. Love. More than that, a fascination. I only passed her in the Hall. I only passed her. But I cannot help but notice that she turned when I passed. Why? I wonder this as I write. Was it a meaningless, worth-nothing glance that she might give to anyone? Or was it something else? Was there respect there? I could not tell. There was some emotion, but I was too blind to see it. I forced myself to look elsewhere. Perhaps respect, perhaps disdain. It does not matter to me. I must see her again. See her truly.  
  
I feel overcome with this almost foreign emotion. I replay the way her head turned breifly in my head, but I make it slow down to almost nothing. I freeze the image of her in my head and I can think of nothing else.  
  
But I must think of other things. I must think of other people, other events. But later. later, I will rest my focus back on her.  
  
Second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour the First Task draws nearer. Karkaroff wishes me to do this for the school and the pride. He simply wants to "prove" that Durmstrang is better. I will do this for myself, and for Aymma. Perhaps if I win this, she can get better treatment or perhaps I will give it to the magical research centers. Perhaps if I win my sister can live.  
  
I wrote to her last night. It made me cry, to think of her alone in the hospital. I couldn't finish the letter. Perhaps I will later. I don't know what to say. Now that the Quidditch season is over, she has only what I've saved and Mother's meager pay for the hospital bill. If she cannot pay it.if I cannot.what if Aymma dies because I cannot win the tournament?  
  
I'm going to start to cry again. I'll stop writing now and go to Hogwarts' library to research some spells. 


	3. Entry Three: Hermione

FROM THE JOURNALS OF VIKTOR R. KRUM  
  
Her name is Hermione.  
  
I saw it written on the essay she was writing in the library. I wish I could hear someone say it. Hermione. Hermione. I could say it forever.  
  
She is only fourteen. I thought certainly she was older than that. No matter. I of all people know that how young a person is does not dictate who they are. No, it is their skills, their choices, their thoughts and feelings that make a human being.  
  
I wonder about her almost constantly, sitting alone on my bunk, having to duck my head so that it does not scrape the ribbed metal that is a ceiling. I lie on my back, staring up at the cracked ceiling, and I wonder whether she has seen me. Was she at the Quidditch World Cup? Perhaps.  
  
I wish that I walked as well as I flew, and I pace the floors when I am alone, trying to perfect a walk. I can dance well, yes, and fly, but walking is for some reason an art I have never tried to perfect before. Why? Why was I so narrow-minded as to think that flying would be all I would need to do?  
  
I know I will never dance with her. I will probably never even speak to her.  
  
I look in the cracked oval mirror that hangs in the space under Ricor's lofted bed. Yes, I am ugly. Why do those Hogwarts girls follow me around? It is my fame. Yes, I tell myself. I am ugly. Why do they even look at me?  
  
Fame is a burden. Harry must know that.  
  
I wonder suddenly something I hadn't considered. Harry and Hermione. Are they. together? Or Hermione and the boy with red hair?  
  
My heart is pounding suddenly. I take breaths to calm myself. It really is not my concern.  
  
I think I'm in love. I've never felt like this before. there are girls at school, older than me, who I might look at for excessively long times, admiring them, but never loving them, never wanting anything but to admire their looks. Making up for my imperfect face. I am ugly, and I will always be.  
  
I envy Harry Potter now, viciously and with great emotion attached. He is famous, and has much better looks than I - and he spends time around Hermione, something I can never even hope to do.  
  
I watch her, in the library. I have only done so twice now, but I think it will become a routine. She is very studious. She is also a Gryffindor, and thusly must be brave. My heart feels like it may burst with all of this unfamiliar emotion.  
  
I cannot stand this any longer. I am going to the library. 


End file.
